Friday photo flaunt.: Environments

I'm hoping to find the discipline to post a new photo each friday so I can have a swanky alliterated weekly post like all the cool kids. If you have themes you would like to see posted, or have questions about photography, art theory, filmmaking, anything that uses a camera. Please, reach out and email me or post in the comments section and I will do my utmost to answer your Q's in a timely fashion. On with the show.
 

Because I have virtually no propensity for picking only one of anything I've decided to post a sampling of images which tie into a certain theme. This week is "Environments"

I chose these shots because of the story each environment brings to the image. In each of these images you could argue that the supporting characters, the context is more important than the subject. When creating the emotional story everything needs to play a part.

 It's really amazing how much the context surrounding a subject can impact what we perceive. Remember kids, "Text, without context, is pretext" And really, all photos are text. Text is just a set of symbols with applied meanings as accepted by a group. Words communicate emotions, stories, and statements the same way photos do.

You'll often hear me quote a mentor of mine who said "Good photography is never about what we see, but what we don't see. We are not including a subject, we discarding everything else." Just as any great writer must also be a brilliant editor, so every artists work relies on the ability to trim just enough fat in order to obtain clarity of statement. I won't tell you I've figured that part out yet, (especially with my writing!) but I'm learning every day.

Young and Reckless

Since blogs are amusing and self indulgent at best and down right narcissistic at worst, I think it's fitting that the first photo in this series is a self portrait. This was back in the day when I was doing the biker thing in Long Beach and took myself a little more seriously than I do now. I miss that beautiful bike like a kidney. I keep praying for work to pick up so I can start saving for another. 

 Another self portrait that my dad actually triggered. This is Trashcan rock, (the puniest little pebble) in Joshua Tree, which also offers some of the most grueling ascent climbs on earth.

 This is sort of a still life portrait. The reels on the boathouse at Triton Cove. Some of the older ones were owned by my G-Grandpa Wiley. I spent countless summers dangling those rods off the dock trying to catch dogfish.

"Storm's comin" A common site from the dock on our little cove.

Taxco. My absolute favorite city in Mexico. A silversmith town that supplies 95% of the silver and other jewelry to the rest fo the country and beyond. Because of the incredible flow of cash and precious metals and jewels, this is one of the safest cities in Mexico. The private security force is heavily armed and very well paid by silver vendors, making them nearly impossible to bribe by crooks. There isn't a crime that is profitable enough to warrant risking the cities import/export status. So both times I stayed here you could hit the ATM at 3am and rest comfortably knowing that 3 dudes with gas powered carbide automatics were watching your back. Also, check out "Cafe Sasha" for the best and most surprising fusion mexican food Ive found abroad.

 Taxco is absolutely amazing. Steep hills stacked with baroque styled buildings including a phenomenal church. Make sure to be there for the weekend Silver market starting every Friday. It will blow your mind.

The boathouse Wiley built with his bare hands. To this day, no one knows exactly how he did it alone.

Forget the dogs, beware the owner.

Another amazing sunset while rock climbing in Joshua Tree.

"8 miles from nowhere", Utah

"Going up?"

Escalators in Manhattan Beach, CA.

Grout is awesome for creating architectural elements without becoming over bearing. 

Float.

I just love this image, I shotit during one of my earliest model port shoots. This was shooting day for night, on a blanket in bright sunlight on a flaxen colored hill in Topanga Canyon. The image isn't heavily photoshopped either, which I dig. I shot it in 35mm and scanned the negatives, changed the white balance and exposure settings. viola.

The classic. This was just one of those family wedding on the beach shoots. I didn't pose this shot at all. When I shoot live events I mostly just let things go organic and try to adapt. This whole situation just materialized in front of me and I happened to be ready to shoot. Although they loved it, and it's a solid image, it's a pretty mainstream and on the nose for my usual taste, but that's just me.

Obviously the 80's were both shameful and wicked awesome. This silly composite is one of my favorite avant garde type shots. This was during a throwback shoot, replicating a series of oldschool rap albums for a feature film. Think N.W.A. meets spinal tap. If you don't know what either of those are, we can't be friends.

This was camera operator I hired to shoot a feature documentary in Jamaica which I produced and cut. He got drunk on the job and feel asleep on his camera, missing an entire night of concert footage from his angle, which was the master wide shot. This photo captures not only the total pith of the guy, but also the feeling of being 23 hours into what turned out to be a 48 hour, 3 layover, 1 overnight, return journey back to LA after a week solid of 12-18 hour production days. Sometime I'll post a blog about that trip and staying at the Hedonism II during "retired German swinger" week.

Although I would love to take credit for this last image, I can't. This was shot as part of our engagement pictures in Venice Beach, Ca. by a VERY talented good friend I met way back at USC in the film school days. Name of Jessica Peterson and she is just the dog's bullocks. She shot our wedding and when The Wife's dress zipper broke, (minutes before runway time) Jess drop the camera and busted out her stitching skills like a rockstar, sewed Wifey back in the dress and the show went on.

So that concludes our first Friday Photo Flaunt.